Cecil Toland Wiggins died peacefully at home surrounded by loved ones on February 25, 2022, just one month shy of her 106th birthday. Cecil was born in Coffeeville, Alabama, on March 20, 1916, to Waite and Louella Hicks Toland. As a child she lived in Coffeeville, Gosport, and Grove Hill in Clarke County before moving to Prichard, Alabama, as an adolescent. She graduated from Murphy High School in 1933 and attended business school at night while working full-time at Kahn’s Manufacturing, a sewing factory. Shortly before World War II started she began employment at Brookley Air Force Base as a secretary. In 1949 she married Joseph Madison (Jim) Wiggins and in 1955 she gave birth to her only child, Susan. After the closure of Brookley Cecil worked an additional ten years for the Mobile County Tax Collector, retiring in 1979.
Cecil was one of the founding members of Church Street Church of Christ, which later became Government Street Church of Christ, the first Church of Christ congregation in Mobile. Cecil was active in all church functions, including teaching Bible classes and single-handedly writing, mimeographing, sorting, and mailing the weekly church bulletin for several years following her retirement. After the Government Street congregation disbanded she became a member of Creekwood Church of Christ, attending services regularly until well past her 100th birthday.
Cecil was known for her cooking skills, always taking a dish to funerals, church suppers, and family get-together's. She was an excellent seamstress, sewing almost all of her own clothes and those of her daughter. She enjoyed gardening, shopping for bargains, and going to the beach. In 2000 she fulfilled a life-long dream by building a house at Dauphin Island that she had designed herself over the preceding fifty years. She loved cats, Krispy Kreme doughnuts, and the Republican Party. Her earthly heroes were Ollie North and Ronald Reagan.
Fiercely independent, Cecil lived alone in her own house until age 95. In 2011, after suffering a stroke, she moved in with her daughter and son-in-law. Her passing marks the end of a generation on all sides of the family.
Cecil was preceded in death by her parents, husband Jim, and brother, Trent Toland. She is survived by her daughter and son-in-law, Susan and Tom Thomas, several nieces and nephews, cousins, and four grand-dogs. Shannon Seltzer, Emma Glover, and Diane Glover provided compassionate and loving care for Cecil during the last eleven years of her life. They were joined by Lucy Moore and Zella Sanders the past two years.The family is extremely appreciative of the dedicated care they showed Cecil which allowed her to remain at home until her passing. The family is also grateful for the long-term medical services provided by Dr. Martin Lester and his nurses Mandy and Brenda, as well as hospice services provided the last four years of her life by Springhill Home Health and Hospice, with particular gratitude to Cecil’s long-time primary hospice nurse, Teresa George and to her current nurse Michelle Morris.
March 20, 1916 – February 25, 2022
Visitation will be Thursday, March 3, from 5:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m., and on Friday, March 4, from 1:00 p.m. until 2:00 p.m., with the funeral service following at 2:00 p.m., all at Radney Funeral Home, 3155 Dauphin Street, Mobile, Alabama. Interment will follow at Mobile Memorial Gardens and will include a special musical tribute to Cecil. The family requests that memorials be made in Cecil’s memory to the Mobile SPCA, Creekwood Church of Christ, or the Dauphin Island Foundation.
